Filed under: Sutras/Suttas
Chapter 8
{244}*1 At that time Mahamati the Bodhisattva-Mahasattva asked the Blessed One in verse and again made a request, saying: Pray tell me, Blessed One, Tathagata, Arhat, Fully-Enlightened One regarding the merit and vice of meat-eating; thereby I and other Bodhisattva-Mahasattvas of the present and future may teach the Dharma to make those beings abandon their greed for meat, who, under the influence of the habit-energy belonging to the carnivorous existence, strongly crave meat-food. These meat-eaters thus abandoning their desire for [its] taste will seek the Dharma for their food and enjoyment, and, regarding all beings with love as if they were an only child, will cherish great compassion towards them. Cherishing [great compassion], they will discipline themselves at the stages of Bodhisattvahood and will quickly be awakened in supreme enlightenment; or staying a while at the stage of Sravakahood*2 and Pratyekabuddhahood, they will finally reach the highest stage of Tathagatahood.
Filed under: Sutras/Suttas
Chapter 5 : Prohibition against killing
“Ananda, if living beings in the six worlds of existence cease to kill they will not be subject to the continual round of births and deaths. Your practice of Samadhi should free you from defilements but if your murderous mind is not cut off, they cannot be eliminated. You may acquire much wisdom but if you fail to stop killing, when dhyana manifests, you will fall into the way of spirits, in which the high rank is attained by the mighty ghost (preta), the middle one by flying yaksas*1 and chief ghosts, and the low one by earth-bound raksasas*2. These have followers and boas that they have attained the Supreme Path. After my nirvana, in the Dharma ending age, these ghosts will be found throughout in the world, and will boast of how they feed on flesh which leads them to realize Bodhi. Ananda, I permit the bhiksus to eat only the five kinds of pure flesh*3 which are the product of my transcendental power of transformation and not of animal slaughter. You, Brahman, live in a country where vegetables do not grow because it is too damp and hot and because of all the gravel and rock. I use my spiritual power of compassion to provide you with illusory meat to satisfy your appetite. How then, after my nirvana, can you eat the flesh of living beings and so pretend to be my disciple? You should know that those who eat meat, though their minds may open and realize a semblance of Samadhi, are but great raksasas who, after this life, will sink back into the bitter ocean of samsara and cannot be my disciples. They will kill and devour one another ceaselessly; how then can they escape from the three worlds of existence?
